So, does this Super Series mean anything?

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A glimpse at the future of Australian cricket or a
meaningless gimmick? Peter Roebuck and Greg Baum argue the
toss.

Yes

A CHASTENED and changed Australian team confronts both the Rest of
the World and its own future as the cricket season starts in
Melbourne today. The recent setbacks for Ricky Ponting's side add
interest to occasions that might otherwise have depended entirely
upon the inspiration of those involved.

A year ago, half the Australian side could have commanded a
place in a World XI. Now some cannot secure a spot in the national
team. Not so long ago the Australia side could have been named a
month in advance. Now the coach, captain, and construction of the
team are under scrutiny. Beyond question, the visiting players will
be keen to add to these woes.

Since the host nation holds the highest place in the rankings in
the shorter version of the game, these three contests at Telstra
Dome have a legitimacy arguably missing from the forthcoming Test
in Sydney. These matches must find a niche between exhibition
matches and international meetings or else the idea will fade
away.

In order to add weight to these engagements the authorities have
decreed that they will count in the career records of the
combatants. Hitherto the title of Test match has been reserved for
matches between nations. It is a dubious move that will have the
desired effect. As far as most players are concerned, matches not
included in their records do not matter.

Not that statistics are the only consideration. Players like to
know when they must reach into themselves in search of their finer
points (ironically these are sometimes to be found on the surface).
Among specialists, batting is not merely a matter of picking up a
hunk of wood and clouting around a lump of leather till a deaf and
blind fellow raises his finger. Preparation is required. Batsmen
are entitled to know whether to attempt a masterpiece or to be
content with a potboiler.

Besides awarding official status to these matches, the ICC also
appointed a respected group of selectors to choose its side and
decided to pay the players well for their services. Moreover,
reporters have arrived from most corners of the cricketing globe.
Manifestly the matches will be closely followed. As much could have
been told from the hubbub that greeted the announcement of the
side.

Since official status has been attached to the matches, the
players will search for their best games. It might not be easy for
Rahul Dravid to recapture the skill and stoicism seen on his last
visit, or Brian Lara his majesty, or Jacques Kallis his measured
classicism or Virender Sehwag his virtuoso demolitions. None has
had much time to adjust to Australian conditions. Still, Dravid
might build a partnership with Inzamam, or Lara with Kallis, a
prospect to delight any follower of the game.

Meanwhile, the Australians will be anxious to reassert
themselves. As Ponting has pointed out, they have not lost a home
series for a decade and remain top of the rankings. They are still
the team to beat. It's just that the idea of beating them no longer
seems as farfetched. Australia needs to harden its game, and these
matches present the ideal opportunity because the opposition is
strong. For the first time in years, too, the Australians will be
the underdogs, a role they may enjoy.

- Peter Roebuck

No

FIRST, there was a shower of press releases. Then there was a
string of launches. Then came the saturation advertising, kidding
us that one billion Indians would be here if they could, and half
the lager louts in England, too.

Then came the players, suddenly available to media as never
before. It was cricket's equivalent of politician with baby.

Andrew Flintoff nearly got it wrong, wearily admitting to a
television interviewer in England in the aftermath of the Ashes
that the idea of an exhibition series in faraway Australia did not
thrill him. "I couldn't think of anything worse, to be honest," he
said. But he has since learned his lines; a six-figure sum will do
that.

This inaugural Super Series has been flogged so hard as to
highlight the fact that it bears all the hallmarks of a dead horse.
For today's opener, the best one-day team in the world will feature
a debutant and another who has not played for nearly two years. New
blood is exciting, and for Australia now necessary, but it is
scarcely the stuff of prize fights.

The World XI will include a clutch of South Africans who have
played virtually no international cricket for more than four
months. The English will be in Pakistan in six weeks for a series
in which they can advance their claim for world supremacy; they
will hardly give to their last hamstring here.

The World XI line-up is impressive, but its team is a gimmick.
Cricket is at its best when both teams are real, and so is the
contest. Shane Warne and Andrew Flintoff said in separate
interviews at the Lindsay Hassett Club lunch yesterday that what
made England unbeatable in the Ashes was that its players were of
one heart and one mind. Inescapably, the World XI can only be about
individual aggrandisment.

Of course, any series now would have paled beside the Ashes.
Moreover, England's epic victory bastardised the Super Series
concept, which was to relieve the world of Australia's tyranny and
the resultant monotony. Then Sachin Tendulkar withdrew. Suddenly,
it was nearly the best against some  but not all  of
the rest.

So this became the wrong game at the wrong time of the wrong
season. The fondly remembered Rest of the World series in 1971-72
filled a void left by an abandoned South African tour; otherwise,
there would have been no international cricket that summer. Far
from fill a void, this Super Series has been jammed into a
crack.

Melburnians evidently are sceptical. Ticket sales have been
slow. Still, the International Cricket Council will not regard all
as lost. "We are confident that our twin objectives of meeting
event revenue targets and achieving maximum global audience reach
will be met," said ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed recently. As
the website Cricinfo observed: "Never mind the runs and
wickets."

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